Ranga Alur Puli Pithe

January 14, 2019
Motions and Emotions
3 Comments

Ranga alur puli or sweet potato dumpling stuffed with coconut khoya filling and dunk into sugar syrup is a traditional recipe from bong's kitchen. Nowadays sweet potatoes are available almost throughout the year however, earlier it was available only during winter days. Hence Ranga alur puli was also prepared during Winter days mostly during pithe puli utsav.

Ranga alur bhaja pithe is also prepared during this time. There are different ways to prepare it. The outer shell of ranga alur puli or pithe contains ranga alu or sweet potato. Outer shell of bhaja pithe also contains yellow moong dal which I prepared earlier. You can view the recipe of ranga alur bhaja pithe here. Recently I prepared the ranga alur puli. The outer shell of the puli is made of ranga alu and all purpose flour or maida. Both ingredients gives a wonderful texture and taste to the outer shell. Sweetness of ranga alu makes the shell slightly sweet in taste no need of adding sugar, this is natural sweetness.

Let's talk about the stuffing now. Normally it is stuffed with coconut khoya filling which gives Jamun (Gulab Jamun) like taste when dunk in sugar syrup. In bhaja pithe you can give the similar filling or you can give coconut jaggery filling.

The recipe of ranga alur puli I have learnt from my mother. I remember my grandmother used to prepare ranga alur puli, ranga alur pantua and later the legacy is passed to my mother followed by me. This kind of traditional recipes are almost going to be extinct as they are time consuming. I would suggest you can prepare the filling couple of days before then the whole process you can do quickly and enjoy this traditional sweet during winter.
Ranga alur puli taste the best when you serve it with warm sugar syrup. If you prepare the sugar syrup before hand it might become cold so when you fry the dumplings and about to dunk them in syrup just warm up the syrup. If you wish you can store in the refrigerator and next you can warm up and have them however I would suggest to eat them fresh. After frying the pulis you can also enjoy them as bhaja pithe if you don't dunk them in sugar syrup. Many people use nolen gur syrup (date palm jaggery) to dunk the dumplings instead of sugar syrup.

Procedure
1. Wash the sweet potatoes and peel them. Cut into pieces and boil them in a pressure cooker 2 whistle or until they are soft and tender. However, sweet potatoes should not be overcooked.
2. After slightly cooling down, knead the sweet potato pieces when they are slightly warm. While kneading them if you get any uncooked pieces, discard them.
3. Now add flour to it little by little and make a smooth dough.
4. Cover the dough and keep it in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
5. On the other hand, take scrap coconut in a blender and add 2 tablespoon of milk and make a smooth paste.
6. Heat remaining milk in a pan, once the quantity of the milk is reduced 3/4 th add the coconut paste and stir continuously under slow flame.
7. After 5 to 7 minutes, add the grated khoya and mix it.
8. Finally add sugar and dissolve it properly and allow the mixture to let dry completely. Keep aside.
9. In a wok take sugar and water to prepare sugar syrup. Boil it for few minutes to make the syrup slightly thick.
10. Now take out the dough from the fridge and take a small portion (similar to big marble) and make a round shape with your greased palm.
11. Put little stuffing in the centre and seal the edges giving a shape of semi circle or crescent.
12. Follow the similar procedure for the remaining dough.
13. Heat oil in a wok and deep fry those stuffed sweet potato dumplings until they are light reddish brown in colour. Fry all the sides carefully under low flame.
14. Now take out the fried dumplings from the oil and drop them into the warm sugar syrup.
15. Allow them to soak the sugar syrup for some time (say 5 to 10 minutes) and serve either hot or cold.

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